Hidden Scars

By Cheyenne Hanson

To the outside world, author Cheyenne Hanson was just another happy kid. She loved her childhood to the fullest. The only difference was that she grew up faster than most kids and got really good at hiding it. Behind closed doors, she was a different person, locked in the captivity of a secret life.

In Hidden Scars, she shares how she was a prisoner in her own world, forced to endure extreme abuse and used as nothing more than an object. Although Hanson experienced brainwashing, manipulation, and control, she managed to survive without a visible scratch.

The memoir chronicles her life, telling how, in August of 2017, she finally used the voice that had been suppressed for so long and extricated herself from an impossibly dangerous situation. It came with high risk, stomach-wrenching, life-threatening moments but Hanson became a survivor not a victim. Hidden Scars narrates the real account of everything she lived through.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Archway Publishing
• Release date: Jul 8, 2020
• ISBN: 9781480889651

Cheyenne Hanson

Cheyenne Hanson is a survivor of fourteen years of domestic and sexual violence. She travels widely speaking about her story and educating the public on domestic violence and sexual abuse. Hanson has also written articles in the monthly newsletters for her local crisis center. She earned a criminal justice degree and intends to pursue helping others escape their own bad situations. Hanson lives with her family in Omaha, Nebraska.

Book preview

1

THE NEW GUY

I loved my childhood to the fullest. You can ask anyone, especially my mom. I was—and still am—a very happy person. People keep telling me that I had my childhood taken away from me, but I disagree. I still got to go out and do everything I wanted. I still had friends. I went and bought ice cream from the shop up the road and rode my bike around. I lived my life just like any kid would: going to school, playing sports, and participating in camps.

To the outside world, I was just another happy kid. Our neighbors loved to talk to me when I went out to walk my dog or get the mail. Even though I was a shy kid, I could sustain the typical conversation of a little kid, saying hi and asking how they were. The way I grew up wasn’t easy, but it wasn’t all bad. I would not change anything about my childhood because of who it has made me today. I am close with my family. I have some amazing friends, and I know who I am. The only difference with my childhood was that I grew up faster than most kids and got really good at hiding it.

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I was two years old when my parents divorced and my dad left the state. I was too young to really understand what that meant at the time. After that, my mom and I moved to a smaller home and began living our life together. It was the perfect little house in a cul-de-sac for just us two. It had a big backyard and faced a golf course. This was home!

My mom’s thirty-third birthday was on April 12, 2000, and she, a group of friends, and I went to McKenna’s Barbeque for her birthday dinner. This was where I was introduced to Jeff. I don’t really remember that meeting very well, only because I was so shy that I was hiding behind my mom most of the time. Then all of a sudden, this man became someone I saw more and more.

The meetings with Jeff that I remember most were when my mom and I would pick him up from the airport on Thursdays. He traveled Monday through Thursday for work as a computer engineer and was home Thursdays through Sundays. When we picked him up, Jeff would get in the car, smile back to me, and ask me how I was. I was so shy that I did not know what to think.

One specific instance sticks in my mind the most. When we went to pick Jeff up, he got into the car.

My mom looked back to me and asked, Do you remember who he is?

I shook my head no, with a confused look on my face.

She said, He will be around a lot more, and we will be going over to his apartment a few times a week.

We dropped Jeff off at his apartment and actually went up and inside for the first time. It was super nice, with a full kitchen, dining room, and living room off to the right of the entryway. In the living room, there was a sliding door out to the deck, which overlooked the pool that was part of the apartment complex. The bathroom was bigger than my bedroom at home. It had his-and-hers sinks and a massive bathtub, and the washer and dryer were right next to the tub. There was only one bedroom; it had two nightstands, an upright dresser, and a queen-sized bed. In the bedroom was a super big L-shaped closet, which looked like the perfect playground to three-year-old me.

After that first time at his apartment, we actually started staying the night when he was in town. It would typically be two to three nights a week.

In September of this same year, I turned four. We threw a party for my birthday, just as we did every year, and I had a bunch of friends come over. I got the greatest gift of my life, a puppy. We already had two cats, but they were from my mom’s marriage with my father. Bianca was a brown Siamese that loved to be with people and socialize. The other cat was a gray Siamese named Ivana, who stuck to my mom like glue. They loved each other.

But the puppy was for sure mine. I named her Treeblie because originally I wanted two dogs; one was going to be named Treeblie and the other Grassly. I thought I was the smartest three-year-old because trees touch grass and sisters touch each other. I only got one dog though.

Treeblie instantly became my best friend. Because of my mom’s work schedule and me being in school, we had to keep Treeblie at my grandparents’ house until she was potty-trained. This made staying at Jeff’s apartment easier for a while, that is, until Treeblie started living with us full time.

With Mom always running home to let out the dog, she would just leave me with Jeff at his apartment to hang out. I was always very shy of anyone, but for some reason, he made his home very welcoming. There were juice pouches, the world’s best popcorn, movies, and a pool, and he would actually play with me. I used to be very ticklish and loved to play hide-and-seek. Jeff came up with a game he called the tickle monster. I would hide somewhere in the apartment, and then when he found me, I would get tickled. This did not seem so bad to me at the time; nor did he scare me.

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My dog, Treeblie, and I when I was four

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Me at age four, when the abuse started

I began to want to hang out with him more and more. My mom was so happy that we were all getting along so well and that I was always smiling and laughing. My whole life, my mom has always told me that her favorite sound in the world is me laughing. It made me so happy that she felt loved and whole. Little did we know that this was just the beginning of a very long lie.

2

HOW IT BEGAN

M y mom’s work schedule was great for a parent with a little kid. She worked nights—anywhere from three to five nights a week—as a nurse in a big hospital. This made taking me to school and picking me up from school easy. I have always been an athletic person who was usually busy with an activity. My mom’s job allowed her to come out and support me at all of my events. But the consequence of working nights is that you cannot leave a four-year-old at home alone.

If it were a weeknight, typically my grandma would come out and stay the night with me. On occasion, if my mom had a long night at work, my grandma would take me to school. Mom would work most weekends at night, so it was usually just simpler to take me out to my grandparents’ house on the weekends to stay with them. They lived in Fremont, Nebraska, which was only forty minutes away from my house in Omaha. I got super close with them by doing this, and they became my best friends along with my mom. But with the new guy in the picture, on the days he was in town, I would go stay with him from time to time.

Staying with Jeff seemed like nothing. I had done so a couple of times here and there when my mom left to let out the dog. Every night I would take a bath before bed, and it wasn’t abnormal for someone to sit in the bathroom with me while I bathed. My grandma used to do it because she didn’t want me to drown or slip and fall. So to me at first, having Jeff watch me take baths was not that weird.

But as I spent more time over at his apartment, it became a little different. He would put my towel in the dryer next to the bathtub, so when I got out, it wouldn’t be cold. He would always want to dry me off, which was when it began getting super weird. He would hug me in the towel, dry me off, and then watch me get dressed. Over time he actually began keeping the shower door open to watch me bathe, and he told me I was doing it wrong. For the first time, he washed my hair and body. He was presenting it as the proper way to take a bath.

He would say, You are always so stinky and never clean. This is how you need to do it from now on. Then he would promptly wash me and show me how.

Jeff presented everything in a fun way. He would tickle me and wrestle with me, but while doing that, he started to touch me down there. At first, I didn’t know anything was wrong. I just assumed it was an accident. But soon a light bulb went off in my head that this was not right. Any time we went down in the pool and he would throw me in, instead of putting his hand on my legs or belly, it was always on my private parts. As time went on, this became a common theme.

Anytime it was the two of us alone, I would always have to shower and play the tickle monster game. He would let me sleep in the big bed with him when I stayed the night rather than my small inflatable bed on the floor. Jeff would always pull me in super close to his armpit, and he would hold me all night. He told me it was so I wouldn’t get too cold.

This all went from being just a few times a week when I stayed with him to anytime he came over to our house and every time it was just him and me at his apartment. Taking baths became a daily requirement, and it did not matter whether Mom was home or not. This continued consistently for about a year or so. I was almost six when things began to get worse before they got better.

3

THE BIG MOVE

I n September, I turned six, and Jeff moved in shortly after. He boxed up all of his belongings and brought them to our home. He said it would save money for Mom driving all the time and save him the expense of having the apartment. Jeff remained at his job traveling throughout the week though, which made things a bit more bearable.

Just like always, my mom left for work at night, and it was just Jeff and me at home. I was sitting in our living room on the main level, watching TV, when he called me downstairs.

He told me, Get undressed and sit on the floor. Jeff was sitting on the couch, and he looked at me.

I asked why, but was answered by him yelling at me to do so or else he would hit me.

He instructed me to touch myself and to name off my body parts. I did my best, but I was six. What was I supposed to know besides private parts, butt, and so on?

He then proceeded to tell me to name off the parts of a boy, and I was only able to say something along the lines of private parts. Jeff was not pleased with me. He explained to me the word penis. He told me what a vagina was and where it was on me. As he was teaching me and going through everything, he was touching me to show me in a more direct way.

I told him to stop multiple times, but he would just get more aggressive when I did. So I eventually stopped asking. At the end of this conversation, I was told I could never tell anyone what was happening or else something bad would happen to my mom and me. It wasn’t stated what would specifically happen, but I always wanted to make sure that my mom was happy and taken care of.

After talking, he picked me up off the floor, took me upstairs, and turned on the shower. Only this time he got in with me. The lights were not on, which made taking a shower very difficult. He washed me and requested me to wash